New Mexico Has Called for LANL Cleanup to be Taken Out of NNSA

Kenneth Fletcher and Todd Jacobson
WC Monitor
9/19/2014

Following a call from New Mexico’s environmental regulator to break out the cleanup work at Los Alamos National Laboratory, LANL Director Charlie McMillan this week emphasized the advantages of keeping cleanup in the current contract. Earlier this month, New Mexico Environment Department Secretary Ryan Flynn said the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management should take over management of the legacy waste cleanup at LANL, currently overseen by the National Nuclear Security Administration. The lab’s director this week offered the first response from LANL to that call, which the state says is a condition for restarting operations at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. “I think there are some real advantages to the government in the integrated management the laboratory can bring to the work that we do both on the science and the EM, but ultimately this is going to have to be a decision the government makes, so until I hear something official I know nothing,” McMillan told WC Monitor following a speech this week at George Washington University.

McMillan said that he had not been approached about such a move officially and has not taken a position on it, but noted the positive aspects of keeping the cleanup activities within the current structure. “The key advantages are the waste management issues we’re dealing with at Los Alamos are tightly integrated into the site, into an operating site, so being able to manage that integration as a whole is one of the key issues I see,” he said. “Not to say it couldn’t be solved other ways, other sites have solved it other ways, but that to me is the issue to be solved.”

Cleanup at the lab is currently being performed by management and operating contractor Los Alamos National Security, a consortium led by Bechtel and the University of California that manages LANL’s NNSA missions. However, LANL cleanup suffered a setback when a drum of transuranic waste processed at the lab was linked to the February radiation release at WIPP. This month NMED outlined its conditions for restarting WIPP, which include breaking out the cleanup work at Los Alamos among a host of other steps needed to begin operations at the facilities. 

NMED: EM Needs Control of Legacy Waste Cleanup

NMED’s Flynn said that numerous issues encountered at the LANL cleanup could be resolved by moving that mission under EM. “NNSA should not be in the business of cleaning up the legacy waste at the sites,” he said in remarks at this year’s RadWaste Summit, held earlier this month outside of Las Vegas. “The money is already coming from the EM program, so EM sends NNSA the money but they don’t get to determine how to spend the money for the cleanup. I believe very strongly that EM needs to be given control of legacy waste cleanup because it’s part of their core mission and because they are already funding the cleanup.”

McMillian: ‘We Have A Strong Working Relationship’

The state also has warned of “significant penalties” coming to the Department, citing specifically concerns at Los Alamos including communications problems, permit violations and safety issues. “Right now it is looking more and more like the problems from a regulatory perspective are much greater… at Los Alamos,” Flynn told WC Monitor earlier this month. He added later: “At LANL there has been really poor communication with the regulator. It is damaging DOE’s credibility. It’s not only damaging DOE’s credibility, but it’s increasing their potential liability.”

Responding to questions about the Lab’s relationship with NMED, McMillan said this week: “We have a strong working relationship with the secretary and we continue to work that. As you can well imagine, we are deeply committed to ensuring that we live in a clean state and our part of it is clean so we’re working closely with the Department to ensure that.” When asked about lessons learned, he added: “It’s the standard lesson, communication and relationships. There is nothing new in that. That’s what we have always done and what we will continue to do.”